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REVIEW: Turning Point: 1997-2008


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Echo_City



Joined: 03 Apr 2011
Posts: 1236
PostPosted: Thu May 08, 2014 2:16 pm Reply with quote
danilo07 wrote:
Quote:
You don't see the United States purposefully destabilizing Canada and Mexico, so we can take chunks of them (at least not in this day and age).

What America did to Iraq was much worse then anything Russia did to Ukraine.Also in 1903 America forcefully took Guantanamo Bay from Cuba,despite the Cuban requests it hasn't been returned to them.The only reason why America wouldn't want to return those territories to Cuba,is to disturb Cuban development.
There is a reason why the entire world hates America.

What Iraq did to Iraq was worse than what the US did to it.

On Cuba, if the US were truly the mightiest "imperial power" then it would own the entirety of Cuba and Castro would have never happened. It controls a tiny speck of Cuba-established by a treaty with Cuba itself-a speck that is inconsequential when one looks at how much controlled land the US has controlled militarily and then ceded specifically because it is not an imperial power, eg: Philippines, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Mexico, Western Europe.

I can't help but suspect that Putin is wondering just what he has to do in order for those who keep claiming that the US is the premiere imperialistic nation to acknowledge his Russia. Obviously taking over a sovereign nation wasn't enough.
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GATSU



Joined: 03 Jan 2002
Posts: 15279
PostPosted: Thu May 08, 2014 2:42 pm Reply with quote
Doodle:
Quote:
It was what I liked about the manga. Nausicaa starts off full of idealism but is forced into more and more morally dark areas.


Watchmen established that kind of tone, but that kind of shift pretty much embodies where the 90s went wrong. Rolling Eyes

Tars:
Quote:
You don't see the United States purposefully destabilizing Canada and Mexico,


No, we just purposefully destabilized Iraq and Afghanistan for oil and heroin. Rolling Eyes Oh, and don't forget what we did to Chile, Colombia, and Guatemala. Oh, and Iran is our fault, too. We even sold them the damned nuke technology back when they were on our side.

Echo:
Quote:
What Iraq did to Iraq was worse than what the US did to it.


Oh excuse me, did Iraq willingly establish itself as a country of disparate groups which hated the hell out of each other? Did it fund a dictator who liked to gas Kurds?
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Doodleboy



Joined: 23 Dec 2013
Posts: 296
PostPosted: Thu May 08, 2014 6:35 pm Reply with quote
GATSU wrote:
Doodle:
Quote:
It was what I liked about the manga. Nausicaa starts off full of idealism but is forced into more and more morally dark areas.


Watchmen established that kind of tone, but that kind of shift pretty much embodies where the 90s went wrong. Rolling Eyes


Whether something is idealistic or gritty has nothing to do with the quality of storytelling.

Madoka and Attack on Titan are gritty and they are well-written stories. The Fullmetal Alchemist manga and Porco Rosco are idealistic and they're well-written stories.

Nausicaa is still a well-written story, and the darker elements help the story. Moreso then the overly-simplified movie version. Take away those elements and the manga would be weaker. And those darker elements add more complexity to Nausicaa's character that wasn't present in the film-version.

Just because the comics that came after Watchmen and only emulated the surface tone were crap, does not mean dark superhero comics = bad. Otherwise Watchmen would be a bad comic, so would Daredevil: Rise Again, so would bits of Morrison's Animal-Man.

The problems with the 90's comics weren't that they were dark, it was that they were shallow.
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GATSU



Joined: 03 Jan 2002
Posts: 15279
PostPosted: Thu May 08, 2014 10:00 pm Reply with quote
Doodle:
Quote:
Whether something is idealistic or gritty has nothing to do with the quality of storytelling.


It matters when the latter tone is wedged an otherwise acceptable narrative.

Quote:
Nausicaa is still a well-written story, and the darker elements help the story. Moreso then the overly-simplified movie version.


I'm ok with both interpretations, but Princess Mononoke is better than either Nausicaa.

Quote:
Otherwise Watchmen would be a bad comic,


It's not a bad comic, but it's just as sadistic as its successors. It's not really as much about telling a compelling story as it is about trashing the whole comic genre which Moore hates so much, even though he became rich off it. So maybe he and Miyazaki have something in common. Laughing

Quote:
The problems with the 90's comics weren't that they were dark, it was that they were shallow.


The problem with 90s comics was Rob Liefeld. Rolling Eyes
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insert name here



Joined: 27 Jul 2011
Posts: 84
PostPosted: Thu May 08, 2014 10:08 pm Reply with quote
I don't think anyone is saying that Russia isn't an imperial power (at the very least, its clear that Putin possess imperial aspirations), but the position that the United States is not the foremost imperial power right now can only be maintained at this point through semantic games or historical ignorance.

Just because the US occupies this role, doesn't mean that its people are bad or that other countries are some how good. Most people the world over are decent and just struggling to get by. Its the classes in charge of everything that are the problem here. In any case, as an American, I don't see Miyazaki's complaints about our government's overseas ventures as any problem whatsoever. He is as entitled to speak out against it as anyone else.
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Doodleboy



Joined: 23 Dec 2013
Posts: 296
PostPosted: Thu May 08, 2014 11:40 pm Reply with quote
GATSU wrote:
It matters when the latter tone is wedged an otherwise acceptable narrative.


Yeah the story veered off in a different direction after Miyazaki realized that nature is not nearly as convenient as what the Sea of Corruption is. The darker elements were part of Nausicaa's narrative from the beginning. End of the world. Humanity going extinct. Nausicaa herself being the only survivor of several children. Both sides of the war committing atrocities.

And what is an acceptable narrative anyhow? Would a nature loves humanity now, Nausicaa has proven it worthy and now the world is saved, be a more acceptable ending?

Nausicaa was Miyazaki wrestling with some personal questions. Like it or not, the ending (and Princess Mononoke), was his answer.

Quote:
I'm ok with both interpretations, but Princess Mononoke is better than either Nausicaa.


Princess Mononoke is my favorite movie, so yeah. It's also a pretty dark movie. Darker then any of the other Miyazaki movies other then "The Wind Rises".

Quote:
It's not a bad comic, but it's just as sadistic as its successors. It's not really as much about telling a compelling story as it is about trashing the whole comic genre which Moore hates so much, even though he became rich off it. So maybe he and Miyazaki have something in common. Laughing .


It's also a compelling story and hey I'm glad it exists. And I think Moore put way too much effort into it for that comic to be a sadistic joke. Alan Moore clearly loved comics and clearly was interested is taking advantage of the medium.

He only started becoming more bitter after being screwed by DC on the Watchmen rights and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

And his later work on Tom Strong should show that he still does like superheroes.

Quote:
The problem with 90s comics was Rob Liefeld. Rolling Eyes


Who made shallow comics.
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GATSU



Joined: 03 Jan 2002
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PostPosted: Thu May 08, 2014 11:44 pm Reply with quote
Doodle:
Quote:
And I think Moore put way too much effort into it for that comic to be a sadistic joke.


One of his comics is called The Killing Joke...

Quote:
And his later work on Tom Strong should show that he still does like superheroes.


You sure? 'Cus he trashed the hell out of 'em recently.
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Doodleboy



Joined: 23 Dec 2013
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PostPosted: Thu May 08, 2014 11:56 pm Reply with quote
GATSU wrote:
Doodle:
Quote:
And I think Moore put way too much effort into it for that comic to be a sadistic joke.


One of his comics is called The Killing Joke...

Quote:
And his later work on Tom Strong should show that he still does like superheroes.


You sure? 'Cus he trashed the hell out of 'em recently.


Yeah, Alan Moore hates DC. They screwed him over twice, three times now.

He hates the state of superhero comics now, doesn't mean he hates superheroes or that he always hated superheroes.

"The Killing Joke" is a comic about whether or not the Batman will kill the Joker so obviously it will be called....
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enurtsol



Joined: 01 May 2007
Posts: 14746
PostPosted: Fri May 09, 2014 1:31 am Reply with quote
danilo07 wrote:

Also in 1903 America forcefully took Guantanamo Bay from Cuba, despite the Cuban requests it hasn't been returned to them.The only reason why America wouldn't want to return those territories to Cuba,is to disturb Cuban development.


The US first got Guantanamo Bay from Spain due to its victory on the Spanish-American War. Then-baby nation of Cuba was pressured to lease Guantanamo Bay as a result of 1903 US-Cuba Treaty. Then it was superseded by the 1934 Treaty signed with Batista granting perpetual lease, with both parties needing to agree for its termination. But since Fidel Castro's revolution overthrew the Batista government, making Castro and the US enemies, obviously the US won't agree with him for the termination of the lease but continues to pay the yearly lease payments which obviously Castro would not cash except once.
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melmouth



Joined: 19 May 2012
Posts: 167
PostPosted: Fri May 09, 2014 6:32 am Reply with quote
Quote:
What America did to Iraq was much worse then anything Russia did to Ukraine.Also in 1903 America forcefully took Guantanamo Bay from Cuba,despite the Cuban requests it hasn't been returned to them.The only reason why America wouldn't want to return those territories to Cuba, is to disturb Cuban development.
There is a reason why the entire world hates America.



Agree. And I live here.

The NSA's bugging the entire Internet is our most recent act of awfulness. Our empire is partially military, and mostly economic. Together they give this nation enormous world power.

Power corrupts.
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Usagi-kun



Joined: 03 Jul 2013
Posts: 877
Location: Nashville, TN
PostPosted: Fri May 09, 2014 9:39 am Reply with quote
I guess I can admit to being a person who sticks their head in the sand. I don't keep up on current events, eschew social culture, and adamantly avoid political debates. I will pay for that in the end. It does not give me a firm grip. I am definitely part of the growing problem in both Japanese and American society. Our innovation and culture withers while we focus on media that prioritizes pleasure over intelligence and retrospect. But the truth is that this is a cycle that has remained unbroken for a long time. The speed of information and growth of technology has only created a global network for our interactions. But long before that, the titular characters we have both idolized and loathed have risen and fallen to varying degrees of impact in our awareness. The 'good guy' and 'bad guy' labels are simply ideas we assign to provide security and depth to our understanding of this cycle. Despite our best efforts, it continues long after we are gone. I am not saying that the roles and justices we assign do not matter, but they actually serve as extensions of our own personalities, senses of purpose, and expectations in our lifetimes.

What I get from Miyazaki-san's writings are a sense of frustration on the part of an intelligent man who has seen the world crumble and rebuild, crumble and rebuild within his own lifetime and within the cultures and lifetimes he has studied to produce the emotions in his films. That, and frustration over the lack of responsibility we all take for our roles in this continuing cycle. Any man would be grumpy after trying to understand and remedy the weight of these feelings at the end of a lifetime. The riddle that comes to mind is whether or not to reinvent the wheel or just accept the road will be bumpy? And only children tend to think in such polarized terms of right and wrong, ultimately proclaiming that one thing we each can do is accept that the blood is on all of our hands, if not from our current incarnations, but from the ghosts from the past, and for the ideals we strive for in the future.

Hope and happiness for all. Nice ideas, but are they possible? Did Myazaki succeed in creating a legacy or just another ideal? This rabbit would like to know.
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danilo07



Joined: 25 Dec 2011
Posts: 1580
PostPosted: Fri May 09, 2014 11:46 am Reply with quote
Quote:
What Iraq did to Iraq was worse than what the US did to it.

It is nice to say that,but you are also ignoring that some of the worst crime Iraq committed against it's own people were supported by USA(gassing of Kurds in Iraq is one of many examples).
Quote:
On Cuba, if the US were truly the mightiest "imperial power" then it would own the entirety of Cuba and Castro would have never happened. It controls a tiny speck of Cuba-established by a treaty with Cuba itself-a speck that is inconsequential when one looks at how much controlled land the US has controlled militarily and then ceded specifically because it is not an imperial power, eg: Philippines, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Mexico, Western Europe.

The fact is that Guantanamo is economically important for Cuba and USA is doing anything in it's power to prevent any of sort of economic development of that country.That doesn't mean it is omnipotent though,every country no matter how powerful it is has it's limitations and those limitations don't make their intentions any less imperialistic then they are.
Quote:
I can't help but suspect that Putin is wondering just what he has to do in order for those who keep claiming that the US is the premiere imperialistic nation to acknowledge his Russia. Obviously taking over a sovereign nation wasn't enough.

This has nothing to do with him.Personally I don't like Putin, he committed atrocious acts in Chechnya and is now illegally interfering with Ukraine.That of course doesn't make American leaders any better then they are.
Quote:
The US first got Guantanamo Bay from Spain due to its victory on the Spanish-American War. Then-baby nation of Cuba was pressured to lease Guantanamo Bay as a result of 1903 US-Cuba Treaty. Then it was superseded by the 1934 Treaty signed with Batista granting perpetual lease, with both parties needing to agree for its termination. But since Fidel Castro's revolution overthrew the Batista government, making Castro and the US enemies, obviously the US won't agree with him for the termination of the lease but continues to pay the yearly lease payments which obviously Castro would not cash except once.

America wanted to prevent the self-liberation of Cuba from Spain,which is why after the war they turned Cuba into pretty much colony(Ernest May referred to it as "virtual colony).Of course later on America forced Cuba to sign a treaty,which ironically it broke itself,turning Guantanamo into one large detention camp made to torture people.I would also like to add beautiful quote made by Theodor Roosevelt on Cubans "Just at the moment I am so angry with that infernal little Cuban republic that I would like to wipe its people off the face of the earth. All that we wanted from them was that they would behave themselves and be prosperous and happy so that we would not have to interfere".If only they were grateful enough.
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Tuor_of_Gondolin



Joined: 20 Apr 2009
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Location: Bellevue, WA
PostPosted: Fri May 09, 2014 11:58 am Reply with quote
danilo07 wrote:
Quote:
What Iraq did to Iraq was worse than what the US did to it.

It is nice to say that,but you are also ignoring that some of the worst crime Iraq committed against it's own people were supported by USA(gassing of Kurds in Iraq is one of many examples).

So, exactly how did we "support" Iraq in the chemical attacks against the Kurds?

If you want to say we enabled it by selling Iraq chemical weapons during the Iran-Iraq War, when we supported Iraq and sold them a bunch of stuff, then that I can agree to. But if you're trying to imply that we were in any way aiding them in using those weapons on Kurdish civilians, you are wrong.
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TarsTarkas



Joined: 20 Dec 2007
Posts: 5821
Location: Virginia, United States
PostPosted: Fri May 09, 2014 12:16 pm Reply with quote
melmouth wrote:
Quote:
What America did to Iraq was much worse then anything Russia did to Ukraine.Also in 1903 America forcefully took Guantanamo Bay from Cuba,despite the Cuban requests it hasn't been returned to them.The only reason why America wouldn't want to return those territories to Cuba, is to disturb Cuban development.
There is a reason why the entire world hates America.



Agree. And I live here.

The NSA's bugging the entire Internet is our most recent act of awfulness. Our empire is partially military, and mostly economic. Together they give this nation enormous world power.

Power corrupts.


I like how everyone conveniently forgets just how evil Saddam and his children were, who dismiss the gassing of Kurdish population centers as if they were nothing, along with the exterminations in the marshlands, and the terror the population lived under this regime. The Iranian's sure don't wash over Saddam's chemical attacks during the Iraq/Iran war.
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danilo07



Joined: 25 Dec 2011
Posts: 1580
PostPosted: Fri May 09, 2014 1:11 pm Reply with quote
Tuor_of_Gondolin wrote:
danilo07 wrote:
Quote:
What Iraq did to Iraq was worse than what the US did to it.

It is nice to say that,but you are also ignoring that some of the worst crime Iraq committed against it's own people were supported by USA(gassing of Kurds in Iraq is one of many examples).

So, exactly how did we "support" Iraq in the chemical attacks against the Kurds?

If you want to say we enabled it by selling Iraq chemical weapons during the Iran-Iraq War, when we supported Iraq and sold them a bunch of stuff, then that I can agree to. But if you're trying to imply that we were in any way aiding them in using those weapons on Kurdish civilians, you are wrong.

When the facts were brought up that such heinous war crime was committed,America not only turned blind eye on it,but it lied that Iran actually committed those crimes.
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